Large-scale vector control is an effective way to prevent the spread of malaria, and to protect people especially those at high risk such as pregnant women and children. But delivering these life-saving activities in humanitarian emergency settings are often extremely challenging.
Issues such as insecurity, displacement, and a lack of safe water and sanitation require a high level of flexibility and adaptability to ensure vector control programmes in countries such as South Sudan, Nigeria and Mozambique are successful.
MENTOR has over 20 years’ experience working in crisis settings to control the spread of malaria and reduce suffering and deaths from the disease. We use a combination of tools most suitable to the context and location for this to be effective.
But to meet the growing malaria crisis caused by issues such as climate change, the spread of invasive vectors, insecticide resistance and rapid urbanisation, we urgently need to expand the vector control toolkit with innovative new tools.
In many circumstances traditional tools on their own are not effective or cannot be used. With humanitarian crises and large-scale population displacement on the rise, we must ramp up efforts to deploy new tools that address malaria and at the same time target other vector-borne diseases that often co-exist such as dengue and Zika virus.
Otherwise, we will struggle to gain control over this deadly disease and cases will continue to increase catastrophically.
Photo credit: UN Foundation